This is entirely speculative, but our research on confidence in residential real estate led me to look at auction clearance rates, and it struck me that there could be a relationship between them and the recovery in federal Labor's vote.

There's reputed to be a third party in many Australian relationships - the house. Australians are said to be in love with real estate, but post the GFC that relationship has become high maintenance. Now there are signs that things might be about to change with auction clearance rates rising. This week we polled on Queenslanders relationship with residential real estate, and the signs were encouraging for the industry.